This is the time of year when there’s one obvious answer to the question: “What should I do to feel better about myself?”

Gardening, of course.

Warm weather has finally arrived, even if it’s been wetter than many would prefer, and people have been getting gardens and lawns ready, fertilizing, deciding what goes where and buying plants and shrubs. That helps the landscape, of course, but it also helps us.

“For a lot of people it’s physically beneficial. ... Some people are into hiking. For those that are not, then I think gardening is just a great way to sort of get the body moving,” said Steve Hancock at Apple Tree Nursery in Tilton.

There’s more to the wellness benefit than just shifting an exercise program outdoors, however.

The Mayo Clinic, among many other health organizations, touts the multiple benefits of gardening. Many are obvious – exercise, growing healthier food, making friends – but there are indirect benefits such as reducing stress.

“Getting outdoors is good for your physical and mental health. People tend to breathe deeper when outside. This helps to clear out the lungs, improves digestion, improves immune response and increases oxygen levels in the blood. Spending time outdoors has been shown to reduce heart rate and muscle tension. Sunlight lowers blood pressure and increases vitamin D levels,” the clinic says on its Hometown Health website.

Hancock agrees.

“I think for a lot of people, the bigger aspect is the sort of mental or psychological, because they’re seeing, eventually, the results of their efforts. So whether it’s vegetable gardening and they are avid cooks and so they get the satisfaction of harvesting and consuming, and they taste the difference in cooking with it – or if they’re into flowers, then they’re seeing the results as they go out every day and look at things growing and see them whether they cut the flowers to bring them in or they just admire them in the yard,” he said. “So there’s many levels of rewards.”

“Unlike a lot of hobbies or activities where it’s just in the moment, it’s extended or repeat rewards,” he added.

Speed helps, too – or, rather, lack of speed.

“People, they’re taking the time to sort of appreciate the little things, as opposed to for a lot of people, I think they feel their lives are fast, right? You’re on the highway, commuting to work, everything’s fast, fast, fast. And (gardening) is the one time where they can slow down and they notice the little things, the plants changing or insects, butterflies flying around,” Hancock said.

Among the customers at Apple Tree on a recent weekday was Jef Demarie. He recalled his grandfather’s quarter-acre “farm” in Lawrence, Mass., amid many other Italian immigrants and how he dazzled the then-young boy with what he grew there, watered from a shallow dug well.

Demarie, who is nearly 80, said he carries that appreciation to this day.

“This is God’s creation. We can’t create these things,” he said. “I mean, so, I mean, I don’t want to get into theology with you, but it’s an amazing, amazing  thing to watch plants grow.”